


Happy New Year

by onekisstotakewithme



Series: A Love For All Seasons [1]
Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: BJ x Hawkeye, Bisexual BJ Hunnicutt, Bisexual Hawkeye Pierce, Episode: s09e06 A War for All Seasons, Fluff, M/M, New Year's Eve, Swamp(y) Kisses, hunnihawk
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-07
Updated: 2018-02-07
Packaged: 2019-03-15 05:58:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,195
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13607007
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/onekisstotakewithme/pseuds/onekisstotakewithme
Summary: “Aren’t people supposed to kiss at midnight?”New Year's Eve. Korea. 1951.Set at the end of "A War for All Seasons"





	Happy New Year

**Author's Note:**

  * For [flootzavut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flootzavut/gifts).



> because... as always, it's her fault (and I can't thank her enough). xx

“Well, Beej, Happy New Year.”

Beej cracks a tired smile, and nudges Hawk’s shoulder. “Don’t take this the wrong way, Hawk, but I don’t want to spend next New Year’s with you.”

“I don’t blame you, Beej. I don’t want to spend another year with your cheesy moustache,” Hawkeye retorts.

There’s a breath of a laugh from Beej. They’ve collapsed onto the cot, and they can still hear the chatter from the mess tent, but here, there is silence, and here in the darkness, there is peace.

Hawkeye starts humming _Auld Lang Syne,_ Beej’s head on his shoulder. It isn’t how he imagined ringing in the new year, but having Beej here, sleepy but alive, softens the blow. He feels Beej chuckle in the darkness. “What’s so funny?” Hawk asks.

“Aren’t people supposed to kiss at midnight?”

“What?” Hawk asks.

“A _kiss_ , Hawk. You know, ringing in the new year with someone you love.”

 _I am_ , Hawk thinks. _Kiss or no kiss._ “Is this your way of asking for one? Maybe if you close your eyes, you can pretend I’m Peg.” The joke falls flat, and there’s a sigh from BJ.

“If I wanted to kiss Peg, I’d say so.”

“But you just said…” Hawkeye stops, blinking. _Is BJ implying…?_

“Hawk.” Beej lifts his head, yawning, and Hawk immediately misses the intimacy. “I have the rest of my New Years to spend with my wife, God willing.”

“Your wife, whom you love,” Hawkeye prompts, because he may love BJ more than anything, but he’ll be damned if Peg and Erin will be casualties of _that_ war too.

“I do love her, Hawk. And I… We…” BJ fumbles for the words. “Ah dammit Hawk, if this is our only chance-,”

“Beej,” Hawk tries, but he can see the look on Beej’s face in the dim, and… he knows. This could be their last New Years, his last _excuse_ to plant one on his best friend and part-time soulmate, before they go back to their regularly scheduled lives where they can pretend that all of it never happened.  

He’s never claimed to be Radar, but he’s always taken pride in how he knows what Beej is thinking. And by some miracle, they’re on the same page, in a freezing tent in Korea. By mutual unspoken consent, they lean in, painfully slow.

When their lips touch, Hawk knows that this has been well worth the wait. It’s like every other person he’s kissed since arriving in Korea, all the people he used to chase away the dark, has lead to _this._ And then he’s cradling Beej’s head in his hands, and the kiss turns frantic, like peace could be declared at any second, and Hawk tries to memorize the moment, and Beej’s hands are in his hair, and this is a war, so why does he feel like fireworks are going off in his chest?

 _I love you,_ Hawkeye thinks, his mouth on BJ’s, _do you know, Beej?_ It’s ridiculously complicated and stunningly simple: every piece of BJ Hunnicutt is tattooed on his heart. But they’ve been dancing on the razor edge between platonic and romantic for so long, and yet… _this is worth it,_ Hawk thinks.

The kiss ends, and they pull away, and there’s something hanging in the air between them, and the fireworks in Hawkeye’s chest have turned into artillery shells, because he’s just shared a very passionate and _perfect_ kiss with the only person in this crummy place keeping him sane… his happily married best friend. And before he can stop himself, like the bad fairy at a christening, he stutters out. “Peg.”

“You know me, Hawk.” BJ sighs. “I can’t keep anything from her.”

“ _What?”_ This stops Hawkeye in his tracks, because _what has BJ done?_

“She told me to stop wasting time and do something before the war ends.”

“But _Beej.”_ He can’t believe his ears, and the artillery shells have made their way to his stomach and he isn’t sure if he’s nauseous or elated or somewhere in between. “She… she knows? And you…?”

“Yes, Hawkeye, she knows,” and Beej is laughing, and if it was bad, he wouldn’t be laughing, right? Hawkeye is suddenly terrified that he doesn’t know Beej after all, and that this is all some cosmic joke, and that kiss – _oh God, that kiss –_ wasn’t any more real than the possibility of the war ending tomorrow. “Told me if I keep falling in love I’m going to need a few more hearts.”

“Beej, please tell me, I…” The words fail him. “Please, Beej.”

“Hawkeye,” and somehow in the dark, Beej’s hands are on his face, a surgeon’s delicate touch. “Everything is okay. We’re okay. Me. You. Peg. Don’t worry.”

The artillery is moving north again, and Hawk feels like he can’t breathe. “Beej, if you throw away your marriage for me, I’ll kill you.”

“I told you.” Beej’s thumb runs over Hawkeye’s lips, and he melts, because this isn’t a kiss, but something more intimate, the touch of a man in love. “Everything is okay. Don’t you trust me?”

“With my life.” The words spill from his lips almost by accident, and he’s amazed he is even still capable of speech. “You know that, Beej.”

“I do. And I know for damn sure that I l- that I care about you more than any other person in this place, and I know you feel the same for me.”

“And how long did you have to go to school to know _that_?” Hawkeye asks, trying to build up some semblance of resistance against Beej’s words, but the artillery shells in him seem to have blown through all of his defences, leaving him raw and practically _bare_ to Beej. Beej, who Hawk is almost certain just admitted to telling his wife that he loves someone else, and what the _hell_ has he done?

“School? Not long. Took me about a week here.” Beej takes a shaky breath, and for the first time, Hawk realizes the risks that BJ Hunnicutt has taken to get to this midnight confessional. He’s jeopardized his marriage, his life back in the States… for Hawkeye? It’s heartbreaking and yet it’s… awe-inspiring. _I love you, Beej. And I can’t say it._ “Hawk, if this isn’t what you want, then tell me. Please.”

“Beej, I… I dunno what to say.” He hears BJ exhale, and realize he’s said the wrong thing, but what else is new? He takes a deep breath, because the fireworks are back, and life has just handed him an opportunity. “Except come here you idiot, and let me kiss you senseless.”

“That I can do.” BJ’s mouth finds his in the dark, and there will be time to figure things out later, to make decisions, but this is a war, and sometimes just surviving means falling in love with the right people at the wrong time, and maybe this ends when peace is declared, but right now, at midnight, the possibilities are endless. After all, it’s a brand-new year. Beej pulls away, long enough to whisper “… Happy New Year, Hawk.”

 _This may be a war,_ Hawkeye thinks. _And yet here… here is peace._

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [New Year's Day](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13801095) by [flootzavut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flootzavut/pseuds/flootzavut)
  * [Fireworks](https://archiveofourown.org/works/13840335) by [flootzavut](https://archiveofourown.org/users/flootzavut/pseuds/flootzavut)




End file.
